Heart: Exterior
by Rosmarina
Summary: Short and sweet piece of E/J flash fiction originally written as a contribution to the Nashville Flood Relief eBook.


**A/N:** This little piece of flash fiction was originally written as a contribution to the Nashville Flood Relief ebook. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer:**Stephenie Meyer owns any Twilight characters and Twilight plot lines that may appear in this story. The remainder is my original work.

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Heart: Exterior

Jasper was sprawled face down over my bed, ignoring his biology book. I sat cross-legged next to him, text book open in my lap while trying to study. I was grateful for the heavy book camouflaging my semi-erect state from the observant eyes of my best friend.

"I can never remember these damn veins and arteries… the test tomorrow is going to suck," he groaned. I closed my eyes against the sound as it vibrated low in my abdomen.

I pressed the book harder against my lap and tried to ignore my problem, focus instead on scientific names and diagrams of physiology.

"You can do it, Jazz. It's not so bad."

"You can say that. It's all so easy for you."

"Not everything is easy for me. Not history. I'd never remember all those names and dates if you didn't help me."

He huffed, unappeased.

"Try something with me. Here's my heart, right?" I patted the middle of my chest. I knew my heart was actually off-center towards the left, but that wasn't the point of this exercise. I moved my index finger to the spot between my clavicles and traced straight down my sternum. "Superior vena cava."

He sat up and mirrored my position on the bed. His jean-covered knees touched my bare ones. I began again, and this time Jasper repeated after me. "Superior vena cava."

I tapped my finger where it stopped. "Right atrium."

He tapped his own chest. "Right atrium."

I slid my finger down my shirt an inch. "Coronary artery." And another. "Right ventricle."

His deft fingers subtly revealed the contours of his chest as he imitated me. Slide, tap. Slide, tap.

He startled me out of my staring. "Alice and I broke up today."

I blinked.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

He shrugged with a small grimace. "Maybe later."

"Sure?"

He nodded and nudged my knee to continue our studying.

I dragged my finger up and to the left across my chest. "Pulmonary artery." Jasper mimicked me again, and I realized the flaw in my plan. In mirroring my motions exactly, he'd drawn the artery going to the right.

"Your left, Jazz, not mine."

"Huh?"

Without thinking I knelt up and reached across to place my hand over his. I moved his hand back to his sternum. "Right ventricle here," I said and guided it a few inches diagonally up to his left, "Pulmonary artery goes this way."

I started to pull my hand back but his shot out and grabbed my wrist. "Show me again."

The sudden flare of heat in my face was surely staining my cheeks, and I suddenly realized my biology book had slipped off my lap when I knelt up.

I couldn't look at his face.

"Show me again, Edward."

Slowly I brought the tip of my finger to the shallow dip at the bottom of his throat, my bare skin skimming his just above the crewneck of his t-shirt. I drew a straight line down the soft cloth and stopped over the middle of his sternum.

My eyes followed my hand, his fingers still touching my wrist.

I couldn't speak, but Jasper rescued me. "Superior vena cava."

I tapped the spot; he spoke.

"Right atrium."

His thumb stroked once over the inside of my wrist, so softly, so quickly, I almost believed I imagined it. I was still balanced precariously on my knees, leaning into his space, tethered there by the touch of his fingers on my flesh, the entreaty in his voice, the temptation to be closer.

I traced lower, and he answered my Morse code questions.

Slide, tap. "Right coronary artery."

Slide, tap. "Right ventricle."

My underarms dampened slightly with nervous perspiration, and I felt unsteady on my knees, but I smoothed my finger diagonally towards his left shoulder, stopping just over his heart. It seemed like I could feel my own erratic heartbeat pulsing from the pad of my finger against the soft, worn cotton of his shirt.

"Pulmonary artery. Show me more."

My eyes shot to his, took in a startling intensity, and skittered away again.

I raised my other hand, index fingers meeting over his left pectoral muscle. I drew them apart, tracing a more or less horizontal line away from the spot, and gathered the dry leaves of my voice.

"The pulmonary artery branches right and left to the lungs."

His thumb grazed my palm, the tickle of it echoing all the way to the nape of my neck, raising the tiny hairs there. Christ, didn't he know how… how… _intimate_ that felt?

"Pulmonary veins return to the heart." My voice quivered as I drew my fingers back together. The end of my pinky accidentally skimmed over Jasper's nipple. He gasped softly, and his hand closed over my wrist like a vise.

Hot. His hand felt too hot on my skin. I started to tremble and shake and couldn't make it stop.

"Do you know why I broke up with Alice?"

I shook my head dumbly. I felt Jasper's other hand fist the front of my shirt.

My body flashed hot and cold repeatedly in waves. Incandescent fires of longing flared repeatedly and were abruptly doused by icy fear.

"I wanted someone else."

Someone else?

I'd hardly gotten used to the idea that I wouldn't have to share him with Alice anymore, and now there was already someone else in the picture? My eyes clamped shut as my heart slammed into my stomach. He was still speaking quietly, but I couldn't hear the words over the sound of my heart fracturing again and again and again.

I felt rather than saw his face close in. The tip of his nose grazed my cheek as he tilted his head. The circuitry of my brain misfired with confusion and desire.

And then it completely shorted out.

Only a total malfunction of my cerebral processes could explain the wispy tickle of hair against my eyelashes, the warm caress of breath against my cheek, the silken pressure of skin against my mouth.

I opened my eyes in disbelief.

If this was a hallucination, it was complete in every way. There before me was the curve of Jasper's brow, the feathery half-moon of his lashes resting lightly on his cheek. His succulent lips plucked at my mouth. Under my tremulous fingers his masculine body heaved…

For me?

Synapses fired like a bloom of pyrotechnics, cataloguing evidence, tabulating data. Question solidified into conclusion.

Conclusion galvanized into action.

I spread my palms wide against his chest, my right hand over his thundering heart, and _pushed_.

His eyes flickered open in astonishment and so did his mouth. I had both leverage and surprise at my disposal. I took advantage of each, shoving him down onto his back, climbing along him as he landed, covering his body and mouth with mine.

Jasper exhaled through his mouth in shock, and I drew in what he released. His air rushed into my lungs. His unused oxygen diffused into my blood as it rushed along, hurried by the thrumming contractions of muscle under my ribs. That blood sped on its course through my body, exchanging materials and returning, deoxygenated, to my heart, only to be pushed towards my lungs once more.

Open-mouthed below me, Jasper bucked up to meet my body, drawing me closer with his fistful of my shirt.

I exhaled.

Jasper caught my breath and consumed it.

He gave it to me, and I took it back – a join of two mouths in kiss, a connection of two hearts in breath.


End file.
